NBC on the Struggle to Get a Mainstream Audience for Hannibal

NBC's Hannibal is one of the best series currently on television. The lion's share of critics list it among the strongest of the last two seasons, and certainly, fans of the dark horror drama are advocates of Bryan Fuller's stylized, gory, exploration of two damaged and brilliant men - Dr. Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham.

Yet, the fact remains: The show is on the bubble. Hannibal simply does not have the ratings to be considered viable for an extended life on a network. To their credit, the executives at NBC see the value of the series and are making attempts to find an audience and allow it to have a life.

Robert Greenblatt, Chairman of NBC Entertainment and Jennifer Salke, President of NBC Entertainment were on hand at today's TCA (Television Critics Association) press tour. They spoke somewhat wistfully about the opportunity to do the weightier and grittier series that we so often associate cable. When a journalist pointed out that there is perhaps no darker show on TV right now than Hannibal, the executive team agreed, and went on to talk about the challenges of tapping into a strong viewership on network TV with a series such as this one.

"Hannibal is - and I think most people in this room would agree - one of the best shows we have creatively," Greenblatt said. "It's one of the best reviewed shows that this network has had since I've been here. And we still struggle to find an audience for it. It's great, we're keeping it going, we keep trying to build an audience for it. But, if this were on a cable network the small audience would not matter. It would be deemed more successful than it is on our network. I don't know why five million people or eight million people won't watch Hannibal on a broadcast network. Three million might watch it on Showtime or another cable network and that's okay. The minute you try and do something that is dark, and subversive, and frightening, and gets into that territory, you start to peel away the mass audience. It's just the way it is. Because the quality of that show is undeniable."

"They just pitched us the next season and it just blew us away," Salke added. "We can't help but get really excited about it. We read all of the research, and the Tweets, and the followers of that show and it's like, 'Oh, this cable show is on NBC.' That's just how they view it."

Though NBC has renewed Hannibal for a third season, it feels unlikely that the network would invest in such a risky series without serious consideration again.